The Violinist of Venice

by Alyssa Palombo

I wiped away my tears. “No one has said. As soon as I am recovered enough to travel safely, I suppose. But what of you?”

  “It was suggested that it would not go well for me if Enrico were to find me hanging about you, causing trouble,” he said, smiling. “So I have a mind to see more of the world, outside of Italy. With Enrico’s money, of course.”

  “I wish that I could keep you with me always,” I said, crestfallen. “But perhaps you are right, and this will be best for now.”

  He squeezed my hand. “I will return to Venice soon enough,” he said. “In plenty of time for your wedding.”

  I chuckled. “Father will be thrilled.”

  “He cannot stop me. What will he do, throw me out of the church?”

  I laughed at the image: my aging father, formidable though he might be, attempting to bodily expel the young, robust Giuseppe from my wedding ceremony. “It is to be in April, I believe,” I said. “After Lent.”

  “I will be there,” he said. “No doubt I will be homesick before long, in any case.”

  I smiled. “Come home with a lovely French wife, Giuseppe. They are said to be the most beautiful women in the world.”

  He leaned forward and kissed the top of my head. “No, cara sorella,” he said. “Le donne italiane sono.”

  As he rose to leave, I clutched at his sleeve. “Wait,” I said. “Where do you go from here?”

  He paused. “Back to Venice, I suppose, to find passage from there.”

  I hesitated only a moment. “There is one thing I need you to do for me,” I said. “I have no right to ask, not when you have already done so much for me, but…”

  “Anything,” he said, sitting back on the edge of the bed. “Just tell me what it is, Adriana.”

  “Will you go to him?” I asked. “Tell him he has a daughter, and her name is Anna.”

  “Oh, Adriana.” Giuseppe sighed, running his fingers through his dark hair. “What good can it do now?”

  “Would you not want to know, if you were in his position?” I asked.

  He was silent. “Very well,” he said. “I will go. Yes, of course I will go.” He rose to leave. “I promise I will find him before I do anything else.”

  “I will repay you someday, Giuseppe,” I vowed. “For everything. I know not how, but I will, I swear it.”

  He shook his head. “You need do no such thing.” Before I could protest, he moved toward the door. “Addio, Adriana. I will see you at your wedding.”

  Tears stung my eyes again. “Addio, mio caro fratello.”

  And then he was gone, and I was alone in the darkness of the cold room.

  46

  RECAPITULATION

  I returned home to Venice at the end of January, without having heard any more of my daughter’s fate. I was not such a fool that I did not realize this was how it would be, for the rest of my life: Anna would be the child I could never admit to having borne, and everyone around me would pretend these events, which had shattered my entire life, had never happened at all.

  Plans for the wedding were well under way by my return. My father and my affianced husband had apparently disagreed over the size and style of the event: the former wanted the large, lavish wedding that would normally accompany the union of a senator and a daughter of a wealthy family and, as such, quash any rumors of scandal. The latter, however, in a turn quite uncharacteristic of a Venetian nobleman, did not want much made of himself. My father was not happy, but he was forced to hide his displeasure.

  I did not care either way what people might think and doubted anyone would ever guess the whole truth. After all, besides myself, only my father, Vivaldi, and Giuseppe knew everything there was to know—Meneghina had never even asked my lover’s name—and we would all remain silent unto the grave, if for very different reasons.

  I had resolved to be as stoic as possible regarding the wedding arrangements and the marriage itself. I had lost and I knew it.

  Yet there was one crucial detail of the arrangements that, when revealed to me by my fiancé, nearly caused me to lose the composure I had just barely achieved.

  Several days after my return, I was informed the senator was waiting in the small parlor for me. I went down to see him in the graceless, listless manner I had adopted since giving birth. It was as though my body could not seem to remember how it ought to move without the added weight of a child within me.

  He rose when I entered, his eyes moving over my form probingly. I had lost all of the weight I had gained while carrying the child, and then some. “You are thin, Adriana,” he said, in lieu of a greeting. He lowered himself heavily back into his chair once I was seated. “You have not been eating well, I take it?”

  I shrugged. “I do not have much of an appetite of late,” I said.

  “You must try to eat more to regain your health,” he instructed. “You do not want to be a pale, wan bride, do you?”

  I do not want to be a bride at all.

  He leaned toward me. “If you think to discourage me with your indifference, you are destined to be disappointed,” he said. “I care very deeply for you, and nothing would induce me to part with you, when I am so close to making you mine.”

  You care for me as you would a prized possession, not a woman.

  To my surprise, his tone grew gentler. “All I ask is that you give me a fair chance,” he said. “I know I am not the young, gallant knight errant that young ladies dream of marrying. But I cannot make you happy if you do not let me try.”

  In spite of myself, my heart softened ever so slightly. “You are a man of sense, I see,” I said, glancing up to find him smiling at me. A bit more at ease, I prompted, “And to what do I owe the pleasure of your visit today, Senator?”

  “Wedding plans, what else?” he said. “The dressmakers and jewelers and what have you—since I know not what gear a woman needs for her wedding day—will be coming here in the next few days to consult with you. Spare no expense, my dear. Choose anything and everything you desire. Though it is to be a small wedding, I want it to be as beautiful and luxurious as you wish.”

  I nodded, touched by his heartfelt words. “I thank you very much, Senator. And has a date been chosen?”

  “It has. The happy day is to be the thirtieth of April, at the church of the Pietà. There should be enough of spring in the air by then, would you not say?”

  I scarcely heard his last words. “It … what? Where?”

  He gave me a puzzled look. “At the church of the Pietà,” he repeated. “Adriana, whatever is the matter?”

  “I … I…” I stuttered.

  How can I be married in that church, where I will see him everywhere?

  “Please, I beg of you,” I began. “Might we not be married somewhere else?”

  “No,” he said, still looking perplexed. “I have been attending Mass there since I was a boy and I am one of their benefactors. And I confess I do not understand your reluctance, my dear. I thought it would please you to be married in the same church as your parents.”

  “Please,” I repeated. “Please, Senator, anywhere but the church of the Pietà.”

  His expression darkened. “No, Adriana. I would give you your head in anything else, but I am quite set on this, and it is already arranged. You are being quite unreasonable, especially as you have yet to explain your objections.”

  “I will not ask you for anything else,” I said. “Just, please…”

  He rose to his feet. “Out of the question,” he said. “I have decided, and so it shall be. I hope you are not planning to make a habit of questioning my decisions in such a way. Good day to you, Adriana.” With that, he moved crossly past me and out of the room.

  Once alone, I buried my face in my hands. Fortuna was, no doubt, once again laughing loudly at my expense.

  * * *

  The wedding preparations seemed to go on around me, as though I were standing in the middle of a river and simply letting the water flow past me, neither helping nor hindering the current. I made decision
s when I was asked to, but did not offer an opinion otherwise; yet somehow, no one seemed to notice.

  My twentieth birthday came and went, lost in the wedding plans, almost as unremarked upon as the previous one. My father invited Senator Baldovino to dine at our palazzo, but it was a rather subdued, joyless affair. After dinner, my future husband presented me with a heavy gold necklace set with an enormous diamond, saying he would be most pleased if I would wear it on our wedding day. I did not know if I would be able to hold my head up with such a thing around my neck, let alone stand through the entire ceremony, but I said I would.

  The date of the nuptials quickly approached, and I heard nothing from Giuseppe. He had sent me several letters since his departure, telling me of the things he had seen and the people he had met. His first letter came from Milan, the second from Vienna, the third from Barcelona, and the last from Paris. The first letter had informed me he had succeeded in delivering my message to Vivaldi, but gave no further details.

  The letter from Paris was dated in late March, and as the beginning of April came and went, I had no further news of him. I began to worry that Giuseppe—the only person I truly wanted at my wedding—would not return to Venice in time.

  My other, incessant worry was for my daughter. I worried that she was not being properly cared for, that the Girò family did not love her, did not want her. I worried, foolishly, that she somehow knew I had abandoned her. And as I had no one in whom to confide, these worries bled and festered within me, a wound that everyone chose not to see and so could not be healed.

  47

  B MINOR

  As soon as I heard the first notes of the music, I knew it was his. My steps slowed as I tried to catch the breath of which the music had robbed me. My father turned his head ever so slightly to glare at me, as though he thought I had some dramatic notion of releasing his arm and running away. As if I could move at any but the slowest of paces, weighed down as I was by the senator’s diamond necklace and this gown with its stiff bodice and ten-foot train.

  Thank God that, at just that moment, I caught sight of a familiar face in one of the back pews: Giuseppe, grinning at me like a boy who had just succeeded in playing a trick on his nursemaid. I smiled back. Now I knew there was one person, at least, in the church who loved me for myself and truly wished me well.

  I collected myself, gave my father a reassuring smile, and we continued our procession to the altar.

  The music played by the orchestra, which was soon joined by the choir, was a joyous, vibrant piece, glorifying God. He may as well have written me a requiem Mass, I thought, for I am only twenty years old, and already my life is over.

  Yet as I reached the altar, the music changed, so drastically I thought my own thoughts had summoned what I was hearing. It was in B minor—of course. Urgently tolling strings climbed higher and higher before the choir came in, each voice part layering on top of the next, moving upward by half steps. Tears filled my eyes even as I quelled the urge to laugh.

  I took my place before the priest, and beside Senator Baldovino, looking as old as ever. My father released me and went to his place in the front pew beside Claudio, come from Florence for the wedding, with what I fancied was a rather self-satisfied smirk on his face.

  The priest waited for the music to finish before commencing, and I could not help but notice that this movement was longer than the one before. A reprieve. I closed my eyes and let each chord wash over me, tears streaming freely down my face. If either the priest or my intended noticed, no doubt they simply attributed it to happiness.

  Once the music—both gift and cruel reminder of what I could not have—ended, the priest began. I scarcely listened to what he was saying, my eyes and attention drawn to the choir loft above and to the left of us, obscured from view by a high metal grille that served to protect the figlie di coro, as they were called, from the eyes of outsiders. I could just make out the red of the robes they wore to perform, or on the extremely rare occasions they went out in public. My mother had told me this, I realized; I had only just now remembered.

  Was he there, as well? Was he watching? Surely he was, directing the orchestra and choir in his work. Perhaps it was merely my imagination wishing to at once torture and soothe me, but I was sure I could feel his eyes on me from somewhere in the sanctuary.

  I hope you are seeing this, I thought, as though he could hear me. I hope you are seeing the wreck you have made of my life. I hope it was worth it, Antonio. I do.

  “I do,” Baldovino suddenly declared, tearing me from my reverie.

  “And do you, Adriana d’Amato, take Giacomo Piero Baldovino to be your husband?”

  “I do,” I said dully.

  More joyous music rang out as my new husband led me away from the altar, though this time I scarcely heard it, nor did I hear the good wishes being shouted to us by the smattering of people in the pews. I blinked as we stepped outside into the mocking sunlight and into the decorated gondola that would carry us back to the senator’s—and now my—palazzo for the wedding feast. I felt heavy with the weight of this new life, of all the lives I had lived before, and all the ones I might have lived; so heavy that it was a wonder I did not sink the gondola straight to the bottom of the lagoon.

  * * *

  Our wedding night, after I suffered through the banquet in stony silence, was rather what I had anticipated. In the master bedchamber, mio marito clumsily removed my cream-colored, lace-trimmed shift—created especially for this night—then gestured for me to get into the bed, where he nearly crushed me with his weight as he pushed himself roughly inside me. I could not even draw breath to cry out in pain. I simply lay there, unmoving, enduring his short, jerky thrusts until he finally moaned aloud in his release and then rolled off me. I curled myself into a ball, facing away from him, trying and failing to hold back the tears that stung my eyes.

  Once he had regained his breath, my husband placed a gentle hand on my shoulder. “You are doubtless weary from the excitement of the day, and perhaps a bit nervous and anxious about this first bedding, as well,” he said, in what he no doubt believed was a reassuring tone. “So I will make allowances. But for the love of God, Adriana, surely you know that a man wants a woman to do what she can to please him?”

  I would have murdered him right there in our marriage bed had I been in possession of a weapon. I wanted to scream at him. There are only two kinds of women who seek to please men in bed: whores and women who are in love. I have been both, but now I am neither.

  Instead I closed my eyes and prayed for sleep to come as quickly as possible.

  Yet before I could retreat into the security of slumber, the gypsy’s words whispered themselves across my mind again: You already know your fate, although it will not come about in quite the way you think … you will bear the child of the man you love.

  It had come true, all of it, every word. I laughed silently at the foolish, naïve girl who had first interpreted these words as a blessing, a benediction, a sign that she was going to get everything she had ever wanted; the girl who had then told herself that it was all silliness and superstition.

  If only she had believed that tragedy could actually befall her.

  48

  INTERMEZZO

  The ocean breeze somehow smelled different here than it did in Venice—sweeter, warmer, fresher. I could leave the villa—loaned to us for our wedding trip by a friend of Giacomo’s—and wander down to the shore in nothing more than a shift, for there was no one else on this small Greek island to see us. I spent many enjoyable days exploring the beaches and forests, as I was usually left to my own devices.

  The evenings were another matter.

  As I watched the fiery sun sink beneath the waves, Giacomo came up behind me, wrapping an arm around my waist. “Beautiful, is it not?” he asked, as if he had commissioned the entire spectacle for my pleasure and now expected to be thanked for it. “Beauty seems to flourish here.” He bent his head and kissed the side of my neck, while slipping my sh
ift down my shoulder. I did not move, keeping my eyes on the fading horizon, until he took my hand and placed it over his hardening manhood beneath his breeches. I forced myself to pull away slowly.

  “Here, marito?” I asked. “Surely the marriage bed is a more appropriate place for such … activity.”

  “We are newlyweds,” he reminded me. “A bit of adventurousness is to be expected, si?” He reached for me again, but I instinctively took a step back.

  “A wife’s duty is to please her husband, in every way,” he reminded me with a growl. “God knows I am not some handsome young swain, but I am your husband, and so you might think about resigning yourself to that, Adriana. A bit of gratitude would not be wanting, either.”

  The more I help him along to his pleasure, the less time it all will take. “I am sorry, marito,” I said aloud, looking up at him through my eyelashes. “Of course you are right. Let us only go inside to the bed, where we will be more comfortable.”

  His annoyance melted away at once. I let him take my hand and lead me inside.

  * * *

  Gloomy autumn rain splashed against the windows and high stone ceilings of the church—a far cry from the weather on that lovely island paradise, which I still thought of longingly from time to time. The humidity made my mourning wear—a heavy black velvet gown and black lace veil—difficult to bear.

  On my left side, Giacomo listened stoically to the funeral Mass, while on my right, my father was—uncharacteristically—weeping. I had never been under the impression that he loved Claudio all that much, but rather only saw him as a successor to the business. Yet apparently I was wrong.

  Earlier that month, we had received news that Claudio had been found stabbed to death in an alley in Florence—outside of a brothel, where there had been an altercation between Claudio and another patron. The murderer was not apprehended; likely the culprit was someone of far greater wealth and influence than my brother.

  It was a fitting end for Claudio, really, I thought ruefully. Yet tears sprang to my eyes as I contemplated how devastated my mother would have been, had she lived to see the mess her son had made of his life.